My Favorite Places to Eat

Everyone needs to eat. Please, just take that as a fact of life and accept the fact that you will never bee as slim as you think you want to be.

So, given that fact, you might as well enjoy what you eat and have fun while you're eating. Patty and I take vacations seriously. We don't go places where we are bombarded each and every minute with things to do and crowds of people. We go places where we can relax and get some good food into us.

In our travels we have found many truly horrible places to eat; far too many to begin listing them here.

But, we have found some real gems. Places that provide you service, personable wait staff and management, and good,. I mean GOOD food. Here are a few of our favorites and where to find them. I've listed them by location. We go to places that are NOT MEANT FOR FAMILIES WITH CHILDREN. These are all places I would suggest that just you and your loved one of similar age go to.

PS If you visit one of these places and find that you didn't like it, please let me know why. My raves are based on visits between 1999 and early 2001. Thanks!

CALIFORNIA —

The best food and a great view to match can be found in Pebble Beach at Roy's. this is one of a number of restaruants Roy Yamaguchi operates, each one specializing in utilizing fresh ingredients from that local area. The menu is typically arranged with their "always available" stuff on one side — and don't for a moment think that this means that these items are less than wonderful — with the other side of the menu containing that day's specials.

The Pebble Beach Roy's is my third most favorite of the set (See Hawaii for #1 and #2) with his New York (Manhattan) coming in fourth.

Roy's - Pebble Beach (831) 647-7500
The Inn at Spanish Bay
|2700 Seventeen Mile Dr.
Pebble Beach, CA 93953
pebblebeach@roysrestaurant.com

When in San Jose, you must drop by the Sonoma Chicken Coop in the heart of the downtown area. Sonoma Chicken Coop features a global appoach to California cuisine with a twist. You get top notch restaurant food, the sort you might expect to pay $15 - $20 per entree for, but you get it for $5 - $10. How? You walk up to the counter and order your food, you find a table, you come up when the food is ready and get it yourself.

Since they don't have to pay a wait staff, you save.

SCC features their regular menu, a lunch menu, and a weekly menu that never seems to repeat itself. They serve beer and wine as well as some amazing desserts.

Oh, and get that "Sure, but it probably is slopped out of huge vats" look out of your brain.

Each entree is individually prepared and plated. And it not only tastes great, it looks good, too.I eat ther at least once a week (and I took these pictures on February 27, 2003).

Sonoma Chicken Coop
31 Market Street
or enter on San Pedro Square
San Jose, CA 95113
www.sonomachickencoop.com

HAWAII —

Unless you want to be surrounded by tens of thousands of other tourists, the only reasons to go to Oahu (where Honolulu is) would be for the Pearl Harbor tour of the USS Arizona Memorial, or to eat at any of Sam Choy's or Roy Yamaguchi's restaurants. Since I stay clear of Oahu, I haven't had the pleasure of eating there but have been assured that good eats can be had.

Here is where we do go: Kauai and the big island of Hawaii.

KAUAI — The absolute best place we have ever eated, both from a food and a service standpoint, has to be Roy's at Poipu Beach. It is located in a run-down little shopping center and you would miss it if you didn;t look for it. But, my oh my, the food is great! The entire kitchen can be viewed through floor-to-ceiling glass. The wait staff curl in and out between the tables like professional slolom skiers, never running into each other (amazing in itself). Like the other Roy's, the right side of the menu changes daily. Oh... at any Roy's you HAVE TO TRY the molten chocolate dessert. It can not be described, it must be consumed.

Roy's Poipu Bar & Grill (808) 742-5000 2360
Kiahuna Plantation Dr.
Poipu, HI 96756
kauai@roysrestaurant.com

HAWAII — Hopefully you understand that there is the state of Hawaii, and then there is the big island of Hawaii. The big island is larger than all the other islands combined, yet can be criven around (skirting the volcano overflow at the south end) in about a 5 hours.

There are three places you need to go for food on Hawaii.

Roy's in the Waikoloa Village. This restaurant is at the entrance of the village and inside of the shopping center. It is large, features an open kitchen and has amazing food. If you go there while it is light outside, you can see across vast lava fields right outside the window. No matter when you go you will be rewarded with great food and a wait staff that excells in keeping your bread plate filled, and your water glasses from letting too much condensation puddle on the table.

Roy's Waikoloa Bar & Grill (808) 886-4321
Kings' Shops - Waikoloa Beach Resort
|250 Waikoloa Beach Drive Suite E-1
Waikoloa, HI 96738
waikoloa@roysrestaurant.com

Sam Choy has restaurants all over the islands and the Pacific, but our favorite is also about the best place for lunch we've found. It is so good that it is always full of locals, the prices are so reasonable that you willwonder why you would want to ever eat at a fast food place again, and it is so out of the way that you would never find it if someone didn't tell you about it and how to get there.

When you next fly into the Kailua-Kona airport, rent your car and then turn right onto the highway (by the way... Waikola Village and Roy's is about 17 miles on the highway the other direction). About a mile or so toward town you will see what looks like an industrial business area to the left going a few blocks up the hill. You know the sort of place...construction buildings, tire warehouses, etc. The thing is that you want to turn to the left on the street just before you get there, go up the hill about 100 feet and turn right into the industrial park. Go just past the gas station on the right and then take the next left. Go up the hill almost to the end and look to your right. There in the corner of a building is Sam's little secret. I don't have any address for you, but ask at the car rental place. I'm sure they can tell you where it is.

 

Cafe Pesto. Way up on the north end of the big Island, int he town of Kawaihae (about 13 miled north of Waikola Village (see Roy's), is a little 2-story shopping cneter (about 10 stores). One of the shops is actually a very nice Italian restaurant called Cafe Pesto. We ate there a week or so after they opened, again about 3 years later and then again last summer. While you can get pizza (good pizza with interesting ingredients) you can also get some great seafood dishes. IF you are interested in Hollywood history, the harbor just across the street is where they built the sets of Waterworld, that piece of c--- Kevin Costner ruined. The cast and crew ate frequently at Cafe Pesto.

 

SCOTLAND — If you are looking for a most relaxing place to stay, great location near many of the open distilleries on "the Whisky Trail" and a place that will knowck your socks off in the dinner department, you need to stay 5-7 days at Minmore House, an 8-room inn. This bed and breakfast and dinner place is just 100 meters from The Glenlivet distillery, miles from noise and civilization, and a few feet from heaven. Sure, Scotland is not known for its hot, sunny summer days, but we have been there twice, once in July and once in August and have only had about 1.5 rainy days out of 11 or 12. The food is marvelous, prepared from what the chef gets locally fresh that day. For breakfast you can have anything from eggs to kippers to haggis to black pudding. I have had everything and keep ordering everything except the black pudding (if you don't know... you don't want to know). Dinners are feasts. Wonderfully prepared and perfectly timed multi-course feasts. Desserts are amazing, too. And, after dinner — since the only other things to do are listen to night bugs, or go to sleep — everybody congregates in the parlor for a few wee drams of their favorite malt beverages. Your hosts can tell you all about what to do and the other guest almost always feature returning people who can give you their own insights.

More to come...

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